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My first all grain came out a bit under, did I follow BeerSmith properly?

MrMista

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Hi guys my first all grain came out a bit under and I think I maybe know why.

I am a batch sparger and in this recipe BeerSmith told me to:
Mash in with 12.5 qt of water
Batch sparge with 2 steps (1.18 gal, 3.11 gal)

What I did is I mashed in with my 12.5 qt of water and then rather than drain that after 60 minutes, I added the 1.18 gal of sparge water on top of it, and let it sit another 10 minutes. Should I have drained the mash water, and then added the first sparge water, drained, and then repeated for the second sparge?
 
I don't really know for sure, but I used two equal batch sparges on my first AG try and it came out close.  I let them drain nearly completely each time.  I was off by about 1.5 quarts on the volume but after boiling I was only 2 points off. 

I don't know if this is right but it seemed to work.
 
MrMista said:
What I did is I mashed in with my 12.5 qt of water and then rather than drain that after 60 minutes, I added the 1.18 gal of sparge water on top of it, and let it sit another 10 minutes. Should I have drained the mash water, and then added the first sparge water, drained, and then repeated for the second sparge?

It could be that your need to establish the efficiency of your mash and lautering.  Still, if your equipment allows for the full sparge volume, you should drain completely then add the sparge/rinse water, let it settle and drain again.  You want to ensure you have adequate sparge water to rinse the sugars from the grain in the sparge process.

Cheers!
 
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